Defaults on importing graphics

[Robert Stoker]

Kevin,

Our Graphfix plug-in may be able to help you with some of your issues. 
Download the trial version from our website (www.seatechpubs.com). 
Choose "Services" and then "Plug-ins."

To solve your anchored-frame-size issue and partially solve your dpi 
issue, try the following:

1. Load the plug-in and choose Graphfix>Settings>Frame Configuration 
from the FrameMaker menu bar.
2. Enter your custom anchored frame size in the "Anchored Frame Size" 
box.
3. Choose the "Manual" radio button in the "Graphic Scaling" box.
4. Choose other settings to suit your needs, and then click on the 
"Set" button.
5. Insert an anchored frame with the plug-in (shortcut: esc = i).
6. Navigate to the image you want to insert and double click on the 
file.
7. For bitmap images, the "Imported Graphics Scaling" box will appear. 
Enter your desired dpi in the "Custom dpi" box, and click on the "Set" 
button. The next time you insert an image with the plug-in, the value 
you entered in the "Custom dpi" box will show up. The "Custom" radio 
button will not be selected by default, but the value will remain. This 
will possibly save you a few key strokes.

The plug-in may or may not be able to help you solve your 
anchored-frame-positioning issue. If you are running the image into the 
paragraph, you can set this as a default in the plug-in, and choose 
left alignment. This action will place the anchored frame in the text 
flow, with the text running around the frame. You can set the gap to 
ensure that no text will appear next to the image. If you don't want to 
run the image in the text, you can set up an image style in the 
paragraph designer with an alignment value of "Left." This is 
out-of-the-box FrameMaker. If you are using Structured Frame, you may 
need help with this.

Currently, our plug-in does not have a way to move the image 2 cm from 
the left margin of the frame (additional coding would need to be done). 
If your images are standard size, you could do this easily enough with 
a fixed anchored frame size. Simply make the anchored frame 4 cm wider 
than the image, and allow the plug-in to center the image. However, if 
your images are not a standard size, this approach may not save you 
much time.

I hope this helps. Good luck.

Regards,
Robert Stoker
Seatech Publications, Inc.
Content Development,
FrameMaker Plug-ins, and
Product Information Management Systems
www.seatechpubs.com

> Defaults on importing graphics
> Kevin Hunter  kevinh at excelsystems.com
>  Thu Apr 27 13:38:43 MDT 2006
>
> 	 Hi all,
>
> I've been lurking on the digest version for a couple of months now, 
> and have
> really appreciated everyone's contributions.
>
> Now I have a couple of questions relating to default settings on 
> importing
> files. I mainly work on user's guides with walk-through type 
> instructions
> with many screen shots of our software. To pull in my images I use Esc 
> +
> fif, and pick an image file and select a custom dpi; is there a way to 
> set a
> default for that? In my version it comes up with 96dpi, but I need to 
> vary
> that depending on the typical window sizes of each of the software 
> packages
> I work on. Currently I have to re-enter it by hand.
>
> The next step is that I then have to adjust the size and alignment of 
> the
> resulting anchored frame; it's initially centered, and I need it to be 
> left
> aligned. The image inside the frame is initially against the left of 
> the
> frame, I need it 2cm from the left margin of the frame, and I'd also 
> like to
> make the inserted frame a constant width, rather than a function of the
> particular image size.
>
> If anyone has any suggestions on these, I'd love to hear them.
>
> Kevin Hunter
> BCD